Football piracy blockade could kill people, internet boss warns

Anti-piracy measures designed to block illicit live streams of football matches could put people’s lives at risk, according to the head of internet infrastructure firm Cloudflare.

An online blockade by Spain’s La Liga, aimed at knocking piracy platforms offline, has seen millions of unrelated sites blocked by the campaign.

Cloudflare CEO Matthew Prince, whose company protects websites from cyber attacks, said the mass blockade could inadvertently impact emergency services in the country.

“A huge percentage of the internet sits behind us, including small businesses and emergency resources in Spain,” Mr Prince wrote in a lengthy post to X.

“The strategy of blocking broadly through ISPs [internet service providers] based on IP [addresses provided by Cloudflare] is bonkers because so much content, including emergency services content, can be behind any IP. The collateral damage is vast and is hurting Spanish citizens from accessing critical resources.”

Recent data suggests that around 2.7 million sites have been impacted by the piracy blockade, despite the number of illegal streaming websites numbering only in the hundreds.

Cloudflare has cooperated with the ban but has described this approach to online piracy as “disproportionate”, and potentially deadly.

“It's only a matter of time before a Spanish citizen can't access a life-saving emergency resource because the rights holder in a football match refuses to send a limited request to block one resource versus a broad request to block a whole swath of the Internet,” Mr Prince continued.

“When that unfortunately and inevitably happens and harms lives, I'm confident policy makers and courts in Spain and elsewhere will make the right policy decision. Until then, it'll be up to users to make politicians clear on the risk. I pray no one dies.”

La Liga claims that the site-blocking measures has seen piracy decrease by an average of 40 per cent during match weekends.

In a statement provided to TorrentFreak, a spokesperson for the league said it did “not act indiscriminately” when enforcing the blockade.

“All our blocking actions are backed by judicial resolutions that assess the proportionality and potential impact before being authorised,” the spokesperson said.

“It’s relevant to highlight that these blockings are requests and implemented once there are clear proofs of piracy signals and content.”

The Independent has reached out for further comment relating to Cloudflare’s latest claims.